The Beach

Ann remembers going to the beach.

I love the beach. Why can't I remember going to the beach?

Chattanooga

When I was little, we made one move to Chattanooga. We lived in a trailer in a trailer park. Apparently we weren't going to be there very long.

It was before Ann was born.

There was only one bedroom and the bed was so big that the door wouldn't shut. That's where I slept. The bedspread was pink. Mother and Daddy slept on a couch that wasn't a sleeper bed but more like and old timey futon. It just kind of laid down into a bed. I only remember Daddy in the mornings.

In my memories, the trailer park is deserted except for one woman. She must have been the manager. I remember leaves and a pool. I remember mother and I going to a park - just the park as if from a distance. Not that we did anything just that we were there. I don't remember swings or slides or sand. Just a park.

Lunch out!

Well, this just doesn't happen very often for school teachers! Lunch out and at the Piedmont Club even!

It was a bit late at 1:30, but the students didn't leave until noon. It was scrumptious and we had entertainment even. Lovely event.

Ruth missed it though, she's prepping for her surgery. It would, of course, been better with her.

Full Disclosure

Nothing was ever discussed fully.

You want to go to college? OK, apply. That was my college talk.

Daddy had open heart surgery and I found out after he'd had it.

Your Father's been married before. I was a teenager when I found that out. Something was about to happen. mmmm Maybe that was the year I had a brother. Maybe that was the year his exwife called everyday.

Mother made Barbie clothes. She also sold them - that I didn't know until I saw my next door neighbor with the same Barbie clothes I had. She'd gotten hers from Santa. I told her where they really came from. Shouldn't have done that.

Information was doled out in bits and pieces or no pieces. Just enough to make you wonder what was happening. Just enough to keep everyone on their toes.

I spent a lot of time in my room.

Anger

I was angry. My dad was angry. I doubt he knew it. He ground his teeth down to stubs. He had a bleeding ulcer. He threw things. He slammed things. I learned from a master. If I had to be like a parent, and in reality we most always do, then I would be like my dad.

So I boiled. I baked. I steamed. I broke things. Small things. Big things. I could pop a pencil in two really fast. I broke a microwave door once. I'm not embarrassed by that anymore. It's part of my distant past.

So in what other way did God draw me to him?

When the kids were older children or early teens, I heard someone use the verse about the sins of the fathers being visited on the next seven generations. I heard seven. Maybe they said seven.

Here's the actual Scripture: (Exodus 34:6-7) - "Then the Lord passed by in front of him and proclaimed, "The Lord, the Lord God, compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in lovingkindness and truth; 7who keeps lovingkindness for thousands, who forgives iniquity, transgression and sin; yet He will by no means leave the guilty unpunished, visiting the iniquity of fathers on the children and on the grandchildren to the third and fourth generations."

These verses really bothered me and I didn't know why. I mulled over them. I didn't know why I couldn't put them down. They bothered me for a long time. It just didn't seem fair that we were held responsible for the things our parents or grandparents did. But the reality is that some sins are reflected in a vicious cycle. Now you probably know the what & why that I didn't. I hadn't given everything to God. I held my anger like a badge. I deserved to be angry! BUT I had to give it up. It had to be sacrificed at his feet, in his name, and for his glory. If my desire was to please him. If I wanted my children not to bear the scars that I have, then it had to stop. I claim victory. AND he gives victory!

The Drawing Power of God

Because I do not mention God in every entry does not mean his presence is not always there. It is. He has sustained me in ways I cannot fathom. When I give Ron credit, I am crediting God for placing Ron in my life. Please know that!

I accepted Christ as my Savior as a child, but as a child, time is meaningless. I did not have role models. My parents did not go to church until we moved to Houston and then going to church meant working at church - fulfilling roles - doing the jobs assigned. Going to church never meant worship. Every church had a myriad of things wrong with it. Every staff member, like every friend, was perfect until they were not.

I left home as soon as I could. I left church right after. I was rebellious. But God was not nearly as finished with me as I was with him. I knew something was desperately wrong. I was empty. And as much as I wanted to escape my parents, I was pulled to them like the old proverbial moth to a flame. They were going to Tallowood, so I decided to go there too.

An amazing thing happened. During the invitation, I felt the God's draw. Now the only way to respond that I knew of was to walk the aisle but I became physically ill. Should I go despite the strong desire to be sick or should I stay in my seat. I felt the drawing. I had to go despite the physical discomfort. As soon as I started to walk, the physical discomfort left and a renewed life began. A time of rededication. A time of yearning, of learning, of surrender. I understood what Paul meant when he talked about the carnal man and the new man. In this period, I became active in the singles department. I met other young people who loved the Lord. I met Ron. In my mind, the two events are intertwined -- meeting Ron and surrender to Christ.

But I hadn't surrendered everything. I just thought I had.

The Fiasco

This is the event that began to bring my mother's true colors to light for the rest of the family. This is the time when my sister and I solidified the relationship that had begun to come together in December. This is the moment that I realized when I remembered, what I remembered wasn't skewed. It just wasn't right or normal.

January was a difficult month for me migraine-wise. I thought I'd lose my mind. I had 16 days of full-fledged migraines. In the middle of this my mom called. We had just gotten back from a trip to see Joe and Blythe and she wanted to know if they'd talked about her.

"No," I said.

"I'm not surprised."

"Why?"

"They've defaulted on a loan that I made them."

It seems that they needed some money to sit in the bank for their loan approval. $4000, and they asked Mother. She agreed. The loan was for two months. Mother said they were two months late and she called Joe about it before we went to see them and Joe yelled at her. He told her he had no intention of paying the loan. That she'd made it as a gift to them.

Well, this was all a surprise to me. I sputtered a few things. I wasn't sure what I said. I tried to stay as neutral as possible. Ron was out of town. Mother said that she had an appointment with a lawyer and that at the very least she intended to ruin Joe's credit. She intended to ruin his credit? This is her grandchild she's talking about isn't it? I mumble a few things trying still to remain neutral, yet supportive. I wanted to hang up.

I couldn't call Ron because I know he's at a dinner, so I sent him an email. He needed to know in case something happened. Turned out that Ron had talked with Joe over the weekend. Joe had agreed to pay Mother back by the end of January.

After Joe talked with both of us, he called Mother. Mother was very short with him, but we have the phone records that he's called. Good thing.

In the meantime Mother mailed us a copy of the check. The check was dated November 8. This is very interesting. How can it be two months overdue if is was dated November 8 and now is just mid-January? Joe said that they had a verbal agreement for payment at the end of January. He's upset over her behavior. Blythe is upset. Ron and I are caught dead center.

The next Sunday we went out to eat. At this point Mother said she needed to talk with us.

"OK."

"I know I was a foolish old woman for loaning Joe the money, but you weren't completely honest with me."

"What?" we ask.

"I'm not going to say anything else," she says.

"You can't drop that bombshell in our laps and quit talking."

"I'm finished with this discussion," she replies.

Now this is common for her. She makes a jab and retreats. But I'm not a kid anymore. I've come to grips with lots of things in my adult life and I don't let up. And Ron's sitting there too. It's not just me anymore.

"The night I called Bitsy, she said, 'You'd think he'd outgrow that kind of thing by now.' You should have told me he had a history of not repaying his debts."

Well! I don't even remember saying that! I was just forming sentences. I was just stringing words. I was trying for noncommittal. So much for that effort. I tried to explain that wasn't what I meant. Ron and I had already shared with her before lunch about how bad a month January had been. We'd already told her about all the migraines, about the different meds, about the crying fits, about the night we got in the car to go to a Wake game with customers and he had to bring me home because I couldn't stop crying and she latched on to one phrase I said.

"You're right. I'm just a stupid old woman." She actually said that.

At this lunch, we told her that we'd talked to Joe and that he told us he'd called her. She called him a liar. We had his cell phone records though. He wasn't the one lying. We also had the copy of the check she said she never got.

We tried to placate her, but this was the beginning of the end. She wrote her grandchild off. If we were Jewish, he'd be dead.

New Traditions

Thanksgiving Day a new way.

We spent it at Joe and Blythe's and had a lovely time and a lovely meal. Brandon stayed there. Ron and I stayed in a hotel.

The day started EARLY - we picked Brandon up at the crack of dawn. Well way before the crack of dawn at the airport and then drove to Greenville.

New traditions for changing family.

Harsh Realities

When Daddy had his first heart attack. I was in the 11th grade.

I didn't know how much we needed him as a family. I didn't know how much he protected us from Mother.

Mother said that she prayed him back to life. That she prayed to God for him to live because she could not raise these girls alone.

I knew that God had spared him. I later knew that God had spared him because he protected Ann and I from the severities of living with Mother.

What I didn't realize until this year was that I would have been OK. Please don't get me wrong! I benefited! My life was far easier because Daddy lived! But God kept Daddy alive for Ann. I had just turned 17. Ann was 10! Can you imagine what the next 7 or 8 years would have been like for her? I left as soon as I could escape. She would have been left. Alone.

This is a harsh reality.

Authority Figures and Abuse

The following comes from a website called nothing more than Emotional Abuse. Charming title don't you think? It aptly describes my mother. My sister and I cried through it. Well, we've cried through a lot lately, why not this?

Authority figures (AF) can be parents, partners, teachers, principals, supervisors, religious figureheads, cult leaders, etc. Dependents can be children, partners, students, employees, religious followers, etc. What matters is that there is a power imbalance and a dependence of some sort, whether physical, financial, "spiritual," psychological or emotional.

1. AF's are the masters of dependents.
   
2. AF's alone decide what is right and wrong.
3. They alone make up the definitions, the rules, and the "consequences" (i.e. punishment)
4. Dependents are held responsible for the AF's feelings (anger, disappointment, embarrassment, humiliation, happiness and unhappiness)
5. The AF is only responsible and accountable for good things that happen, never the bad ones. Thus the AF' appears to always be in the right and when things go wrong, the dependent is always blamed and feels responsible and guilty.
6. The AF tries to exercise total control of the dependent by controlling his thoughts, feelings and behavior. Whenever this control is not absolute, the AF feels threatened.
7. The dependent's individuality is minimized as much as possible by the AF.
8. The AF creates an intricate system of punishments and rewards which rob the dependent of any sense of inner direction and esteem.
9. The following freedoms listed by Virginia Satire are denied to the dependent as much as possible:
10. The freedom to perceive
    

    • To think and interpret

    • To feel

    • To want, need, and chose

11. The AF never (or rarely) admits mistakes or apologizes.
12. All of the above take place in a way which does not expose the AF's true motives and none of this is openly talked about. No "back talk" is allowed

Some of the Consequences

· Mistakes are concealed

· People are under constant stress

· Needs are frustrated, denied

· Fear dominates

· Power is based on fear, not respect

· Information is withheld and distorted

· Information flow is primarily from top down

· Behavior is forced; does not come naturally

· Behavior is not consistent with true feelings, which adds to the stress

· Conflicts and problems are blamed on the dependent's "poor attitudes" and "character flaws."

All of this tears the dependent person apart, causing self-alienation and even self-loathing. The dependent person loses faith in his/her own mind and feelings with devastating self-esteem consequences. Depression, rage, mood swings, co-dependency, self-injury and self-destruction are typical outcomes. If the authority figure is a parent the person will likely develop symptoms of various "disorders" such as the so-called Borderline Personality disorder, Social Anxiety Disorder, Anoexia, Bulemia etc.

The Move and After

My mom had been talking about moving to Winston Salem almost since the day my dad died. She talked about moving to Little Rock first. That's where my sister was. She offered to buy a townhouse for my sister. My sister wisely said no knowing that one day mother would call that favor and move in.

About five or six years ago, when mother came out, she asked to start looking at condos. She actually put a hold on some new units over by Wake Forest but let that lapse. I figured it was just talk and wasn't worried about it. I was in no hurry for this to happen.

Then she got sick. One winter she got pneumonia or something as serious, and in her version of events, no one would take her to the doctor. She was so sick she crawled around the house, so she decided to move here so that Ron and I could take care of her if she ever got that sick again.

She wanted to move into the boy's rooms with the bathroom in between. We told her that wouldn't work. The boy's weren't finished coming home. They'd not graduated from college/grad school yet. Even when they did we'd like for them to have a place to stay. There was a unit right across the street from us. That would be nice -- a little close but nice. She could walk over for dinner occasionally, go to the grocery store or shopping with us. She wasn't interested in that though, so we looked for something else and she eventually found something by the church.

Now the adventure began.

Ron offered to fly out and drive back out here with her, but Mother would never give us a firm date. She got Ann to do it instead and she'd been fussing that we weren't there helping. When she got to Winston Salem, she had no idea when the moving van would get here. It was almost a week later.

She wanted to help in the Media Center so I got Kathleen to train her, but she never would start working. She went to Sunday School with Ruth Ann once and talked about how terrible the teacher was, so she never went again. She signed up to work in Children's Bible Fellowship, but she complained about Sherri and the people in her class all year. She went to one of the Senior Adult Luncheons, but no one called her, so she didn't go back. She wanted to work in Children's Choir, so I introduced her to Gale Foster. I guess they didn't know they were supposed to call her either. This past year, she has gone to a class of very old women and felt at home, but she's made no friends.

She has made very good friends with two women in her complex, Barbara and Mary Ellen.

The week school started, Ron gets a phone call from Mother while he is on the golf course. She's upset, but too upset to talk. He calls me, I call her. I go over. I call Ann before I go. I don't know what I'll meet. We pray.

She's miserable. She's got no friends. She's lonely. Her driver's license has expired. She can't pass the test. She wants to go home. She's never been in such debt.

She's been telling Ann all this with a whispered "Don't tell Ron and Bitsy," so I know, but I don't know.

I walk her through. "Where's home?"

"Arkansas."

"If we could get you there, would that make you happy?"

"I don't know. I don't have anywhere to stay now."

"What if we could find somewhere for you to stay?"

I asked enough questions to circle it back down to the fact that her drivers license has expired. Now she let this happen, but I don't bring that up. She's known since she moved here it would happen. She took it twice in the first week she was here and failed it. She said she went again but can't pinpoint for us when that other time was. She waited until the week school starts to make an issue over it when it expired on her birthday in July. The timing is suspicious . . .

I took her out to eat lunch when all was said and done. I asked her if she'd like to try a different Sunday school class with one of my friends. Ruth Ann's class has a new teacher and they have raved about her. That teacher is a friend of mine too. Maxine's teacher is excellent. How would that be? Oh, that would be wonderful! Both ladies have taken mother's number. I brought Mother in so they could work out the details. Told them both she'd not made friends where she was. Told them that she'd like to go with either of them. Where is she? Why isn't she here this week? I don't know. I can't make her come. I appreciate your efforts.

Mother said that she thought about going to a driving school. I told her that was an excellent idea. I would find one for her to go to. She wanted my help preparing for the test. I told her I'd make flash cards if I could take her book. This was Friday afternoon. Sunday morning she asked for her book back. I hadn't gotten flash cards made yet because it was the first week of school. She asked Ron to make sure she got to the grocery store each week. He said he'd do that. I gave her the school's name and number I found that was conveniently located so that Ron and I could get her there.

The students returned on Wednesday. Ron called the next Saturday and took Mother to the grocery store on that day. Sunday he picked her up for church after he dropped me off as is our custom and we went out for lunch. Monday she called and asked about school. This caught me off guard. For a few minutes she acted like she cared. Then she said, "I'm going to put some pressure on you. I need some help with this test. Will you help me?" Ann had been here over the weekend. She'd drilled Mother all weekend, but I hadn't done enough. We picked her up for dinner, and Ron casually asked her when her drivers license expired and she actually said it had a few more days on it. She lied. He said, why don't you see if you can get your Arkansas license renewed online. I suggested he try to do that for her while she was over our house. When he looked it up, the instructions said that it expired on the birth date and he read that to her. She had to admit then that it was expired.

He drilled her while I fixed dinner. She hasn't called the driving school. She has no intention of calling them. She got someone else to take her to the grocery store the next weekend.

Ron called twice the morning of the letter. He most likely won't call again.

Ann

I have a sister.

It's true I do. For years no one would have known it necessarily because I didn't talk about her much. There is six and a half years difference between us. We didn't run in the same circles growing up, so of course friends didn't overlap. We didn't talk much as adults. We lived and learned about each other through my mother. Isn't that a very odd way of doing things. It's the way my mother set it up.

This past Christmas we got a chance to talk and started to rebuild some bridges - still not understanding why they needed RE-building.

The reason for the need started to become clear near the end of January and early February. Our Mother had been the master puppeteer. She guided and directed and shared stories and items and tidbits that were designed to keep us apart. Stories that had a basis in reality but which were not true.

We've had to apologize to each other multiple times. We believed her! Why wouldn't you believe your mother. You are supposed to be able to believe your mother. I think we've gotten past that apologizing for not trusting that the other would know better, do better, act better -- but just past it. Now we've started to apologize for the hurt she's inflicted - the pain she's caused. The pain she can still cause.

Friendships

I didn't see the evidence of friendships growing up.

My Dad had no friends.

My Mom had friends, but as soon as a disagreement arose, they were gone. They were best friends and then they were no friends. I don't know how to describe the feeling of this, especially if they had a girl that was my friend.

Learning friendships as an adult has been terribly difficult. I've got them, but they've been few. They've been precious.

There is Rita. What would I have done without the Myers and Rita growing up. I can't imagine. How would I have made it through my teenaged years without having had the Myers's house as a refuge? Did they even know? I haven't talked to Rita in years, but I think of her so often. I need to try to find her.

There is Sharon. She was my first friend in Atlanta. Our children were best friends for years. We can pick up at the drop of a hat. It amazes me how God brought us together and keeps us bonded over the time periods that we miss.

There is Wendy. We talk daily. We talk about spiritual matters, educational matters, family matters. I can't think of anything that is out of bounds.

There are my friends at CBDS. Now this is amazing to me, because before I started working here, I counted my friends on one hand. I never in my wildest dreams thought that I'd ever have more than one or two friends at time. I'd never seen it modeled. I didn't think it could be done. I didn't know that a group of men and women could love and care for each other through Jesus Christ in friendship. Most especially, there are my precious, precious friends who have listened to my scarred past and hurts and have hugged me and cried with me and have loved me unconditionally.

Irony

September 7 I had a migraine that Imitrex didn't help, so I came home and went to bed. These migraines are exhausting. My face stays numb, my head continued to ache even when the migraine itself goes away.

So when Ron brought the mail in and said, you have a letter from your Mother, I asked him to read it - I just didn't have the strength myself.

I knew that eventually, the past would have to meet the present. I'd already been thinking about the things that would have to be addressed - a mental laundry list if you will, but the fact that I'd just written about letters and then one presented itself was almost too much to handle.


Then we get the letter. This one was scathing. She loved and trusted Daddy. Daddy had told her before he died to never trust Ron. She should not have let us move her out here. We moved her out here with dishonest intentions. Where did that come from? We did not move her out here. That was her decision. She would not even tell us when so that Ron could fly out and drive out with her like he offered. We do not come over enough, we do not do enough, we do not spend enough, we are not there enough. She is going to see a pastor at our church.

Is that last line a threat? It's hard to tell with the fantasy the letter is. Mother loved Daddy? She trusted him? Daddy didn't like or trust Ron? OH my goodness!

What would she like to see? Us not go on business trips? Ron not drive a company car? We tell her where we are going and why we are going and yet she still tells Ann that we never tell her anything or that it's been three weeks since we've seen her.

Then there's the part about us moving her out here. She announced to us that she wanted to move out to be near us so that she would be near someone in case she got sick again. She'd had pneumonia the winter before and was all alone and it scared her! I told several friends at work how uncomfortable I was with the idea.

This is typical of how she operates. Expectations that she has kept secret, but expects you to know. She dumps them on you ceremoniously and then expects life to go on as usual. Well it can't. How do you do that when she tells you that she doesn't trust the man you've adored for almost 30 years?

I'll go forward, but I won't be abused. That's one thing I've learned in 2007.

The messiest house in town

That would be our house. You really needed to see it to believe it. Mother always said it was Daddy's fault. Well eventually Daddy died and it was evident that it wasn't Daddy's fault.

We had stuff everywhere for as long as I can remember. It wasn't as bad when we were in El Paso, but there was still stuff. I remember a day when Mother entered my room and told me it was a pig sty. "What?" I thought. "How is my room different from everywhere else?" A that point I made a decision to be different - to be neat. I picked up every little thing angrily thinking that I would show her that should would never have to tell me to pick up anything again and she didn't.

In Houston, things were always messy. Ann made the comment recently that when company came, literally everything got shifted to Mother and Daddy's room. That was housekeeping. When they moved to Arkansas, things were so bad that you had to move stacks of things to have a place to sit or to eat at the table. When Daddy died, the floor was caked in dog hair.

Sometime near the end of last year, I asked a friend with experience in this field what that kind of housekeeping meant and she suggested undiagnosed depression. This could well be. Mother's been desperately unhappy for as long as I can remember. Daddy was a terrible disappointment. Most of her friends didn't live up to her expectations. Goodness knows Ann and I haven't, so it's entirely possible. Undiagnosed depression could explain some things.

Isolation

When I got in trouble, there was never a discussion. There was almost always a letter. I knew when I got home from school and there was a letter sitting on my bed that I'd done something that would let me know that had disappointed my again. It would tell me the infraction and the punishment which was usually some period of isolation in my room. We never talked about it.

I don't remember ever what I did. But I do remember the letters and how my heart sank with each one.

Preparing to Sell

I've been taking pictures of items to sell on eBay. I thought it would be hard. It's not been. I thought Ron might object -- even at first. He's not.

It's amazingly freeing to clean things up and package them in ways to sell - especially things associated with someone who has squeezed all the love out of your feelings and left them full of nothing but hurt and pain.

One thing this has brought back to haunt me though is one of the 13 characteristics that I suffer from dreadfully: Following a project through from beginning to end. I'm great at starting them. I'm full of plans, but it's hard to get past a certain point. I think it's fear.

I've got to do this though.

Cleaning House

I am literally cleaning house.

This is not just a mental exercise but a physical one as a well. Ron came home yesterday and said, "Oh my goodness." That surprised me because it's my phrase in this home.

Mother's given us lots of things over the years. Not new things, of course. Things that had been hers that she no longer wanted. Things that she had replaced with something new. I had them tucked away. I pulled them out. There were quite a few of them.

I started with an partial inventory, then I called Replacements.

Then I looked on Ebay.

Then I called Brenda. Again.

I think I'll stop by Barnes and Noble and get a book to take on the trip to this convention (another lavishly viewed trip, I'm sure) to read in the car. There were a good number of them on Amazon on how to sell things on Ebay. I bet I can find one at the book store that will teach me the ropes.

It's time to clean house.

Introvert or Extrovert

For years, I thought I was an introvert. Really! People who know me now are shocked to hear this. I was insecure. I was quiet. I did have bursts of occasional loudness, but they were few and far between. I was easily intimidated. On the Meyers-Briggs, I was a high I. I have the tests to prove it. I can pull them out for you.

The fact of the matter is that I'm not an introvert. I'm an extrovert and a fairly high one at that! Imagine what it took to squelch a social being, a communicator, the teacher who acts out columns, the one not afraid to go to the headmaster and say, "what?" into a wall flower, a child afraid to peep, with few friends.

When I say my memories began with Ron, I mean my very life began with Ron. He prodded me, he poked me, he pushed me. He made me realize that I am loved and I realized then that God probably really loved me too and that the commitment I'd made to Him years ago wasn't a sham like the life my family had always lived, but it could be real and sustaining like my life with Ron was. The two events are intertwined. Rededication and meeting Ron.

Slowly, this self-imposed shell fell away.

Affairs of the Heart

I don't know if affairs are really of the heart. What I do know is that they are heart-wrenching. My dad was what is fondly known as a philanderer. Where in the world did that term come from? Sounds dashing doesn't it? Well, it's not.

I didn't always know that my dad ran around on my mom. I knew their relationship was almost always strained. I thought that was how everyone's marriage was. It wasn't until I was 19 or 20 that I knew for sure . Daddy was a graduate assistant for Dale Carnegie courses and there was a woman in one of his courses, Ruth. She was older, divorced, attractive, and Daddy began spending a lot of time with her. He helped her do all the things a single woman needed help with. She had a cute little single sister and he helped her too. He confided in me. What a treat to find out that what you suspected was true. He loved her. He loved Mother, but he loved her. Wow.

Now the only parent to whom I could talk had put me in a position in which I could no longer talk with him. I was so disappointed. He needed someone, I knew he did. Mother was impossible, but this was not right and it wasn't right for him to tell me! What in the world was he thinking!

He had one other affair that I knew about for sure. This one was with a woman named Dixie. Dixie worked in the office with Daddy. She was not attractive or cute, but she was available. Daddy actually left Mother for Dixie and moved in with her. I was older now. Ann was the same age I'd been before. Amazing coincidence huh? AND you know what else? He told Ann about it! What makes a man want to tell his daughters about his affairs?

I had the boys and we were in Atlanta. Mother and Daddy had moved to Dallas and Daddy left Mother. Pretty despicable. Lower than I thought Daddy could stoop. Lower than even Mother deserved. She drove out to stay with us for a while and he cleaned out a couple of their checking accounts. I didn't think he had it in him. He was always the generous one. He was always the one to make sure everyone was taken care of.

They reconciled eventually. Did Daddy stop? I doubt it.

I remember when I first came to grips with the fact that my childhood wasn't normal thinking that the reason for this was that my dad was a philanderer. Now I know that this wasn't the entire reason. It took me a while to realize why I thought that. My entire adult life, and possibly long before, that's what I'd been told. It's not true, but it's what I'd been told. It is part of the truth but not the entire truth.

Birthdays and Christmases

As a kid, I remember one birthday. I'm not sure how old I was but we were in Houston. My Mother's mom had had a nervous breakdown. It was so memorable, that I don't remember whether my folks were in Texarkana or whether they were back home. I just remember that MaMa Beall had that nervous breakdown and they'd been gone.

I remember one childhood Christmas. We left Fort Worth to move to El Paso over the holidays. We had a little net tree in the car and I got a Dating Game. Daddy got strep throat and I remember them complaining because he went to a charity hospital and he had to wait and wait and wait. Finally he asked who he had to pay to see someone and he got to see someone really fast.

When I was in the 11th Grade right before Thanksgiving, my dad had a massive heart attack. I remember that Christmas because I didn't think I'd have another with him. He was home by Christmas though. I was grateful.

When I turned 18, we had a football game that night and my friends Rita and Annette and I went to the game and then out for dinner. I don't remember where we went afterwards! I do remember sitting in the stands and cheering. They got me a corsage with streamers. One of those big ones in the school colors with the school names on it. We went out to the parking lot arm in arm when it was over.

Faded Photographs

I have said for ages that my life started when I married Ron. I did not say it lightly. I did not say it in the biblical sense -- for a man shall leave his family and cleave to his wife. I really mean it. Essentially, my memories begin with Ron. My sister will mention an event and I look at her blankly. She gives surrounding details and I still don't remember.

Consider a photo album that has been through a flood. Pictures have been blurred and faded. You can pick out details if you look hard enough. You can remember the surrounding events if you spend enough time with each page. And occasionally a picture is remarkably, amazingly, astoundingly clear. The time-line is odd and disjointed. Dates come in and out in a jumbled fashion. You are young, you are old. It is yesterday, it is years ago.

My sister and I have been loosely estranged for years. The reasons will become clear as I write, I hope, I'm sure, they must. That's part of the purpose of this journey. Some things must be dealt with. Some things can't stay hidden. The question is, can the faded become clear?

Josh McDowell

Josh McDowell was at Calvary Baptist Day School today.

Pretty significant event and it took tons of work to make it happen. He spoke to the 8th grade up and didn't mince many words with them. In the evening, he spoke to the parents and minced even fewer words with them.

Long day, I'm pooped.

The Kitchen

The main living area seemed the place to start and the kitchen for some reason grabbed my attention first. So, I stripped the wallpaper, scraped off the popcorn ceiling (not for the feint of heart), primed, painted, and hung new blinds.

Here's what I started with. It didn't look bad, I'd just been looking at it for about eight years and it was starting to show some wear and tear. The trim was starting to discolor, the paper was peeling just a bit at the edges, and my tastes have changed!

The Before Pictures

The Inbetween Pictures

Middle of the road. Ceiling wasn't hard, but boy did it make a mess. It was a constant clean up so it wouldn't become such a big job (and I didn't want to track it into the rest of the house).

The After Pictures

I was very happy with the end results! I had a few moments when I wasn't sure how the color would really turn out, but I was really happy with overall look.

Skip Prosser

Skip Prosser died at age 56. And it hit close to home. I saw the man in person week in and week out in winter. I saw him on TV even more. I drove by Wake Forest on a nearly daily basis. I've taken classes on campus. I took kids to competitions there. I have friends who are graduates. He was four years younger than my husband. We have less than the six degrees of separation.

I could hardly wait until Ron got home to tell him dozens of things that night. I love him. He means the world to me. He's my partner, my encourager, OH how the list could go on and on. God's gift that I never expected. He knows those things, but I had to tell him because the fact of the matter is that like Nancy Prosser, tomorrow, Ron could go to work and I could get that phone call. Or it could be the other way around.

I don't want to take him for granted.

Another father charged in family tragedy

There is only one answer to this and that is Jesus - A real, saving-grace, knowledge of Him. I had to add that because apparently this father went to church.

http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/l...l=chi-news-hed

Tim Russert and Where?

from the evening newsI didn't see it. Another teacher told me about it.

http://youtube.com/watch?v=PWcjBDza0zI

This one has a little more surrounding verbage

http://youtube.com/watch?v=M0yQ83xeluI

(I'm not immune from this btw. I make my fair share of mistakes and frequently have to say, "please let me begin again.")

Another Kitchen Project

When we first moved into the townhouse, all the appliances were original. The stove was one of the first things that had to be replaced. The original was a single unit microwave/stove, and try as we might, we could not find a replacement for it. We had to buy a microwave and a stove. When the house was finished, they didn't connect the ceramic tile behind the stove. ACK! We had a space of drywall and no tile.

I went to the craft store and got supplies for a mosaic. It wasn't a difficult project. The supplies were

• thick glue
• broken pieces of tile
• grout

Then you just start arranging the pieces so they look good to you.

Corzine Deserves Seatbelt Summons

http://1010wins.com/pages/353364.php...ntentId=411065

I've seen several articles on this. Apparently the good governor just flat out refused to wear one.

He is Alive!

Ron and I went to Easter Service last night with many of the other regulars to make room for the not-so-regulars this morning So I was searching for Easter related items on the net this a.m. while waiting for the oven to heat.

I thought it was lovely - very different from the usual. My search was "He is Alive" http://www.theruined.com/Art/sketches/HeisAlive.htm

Praise God! He is Alive!